A bit early I know but...

[suzieqtwa]

I used to cut down a tree every year ,but I got sick of the needles falling all over the house ,and finding them for months after ,so I got a 8 ft tall fake tree with lights on it ,and I love it. Its so easy to put up ,and we have tons of decorations. I use glade plug in ,pine scent to make it smell good. I usually put it up after Thanksgiving.

[kiwi girl]

I haven't had a tree since I left home, but after 13 years of renting BF and I now have our own home - so I think I'll get a tree this year - probably just a small artificial one though

[emily_in_nc]

We put up Christmas trees early in our marriage but have kinda gotten away from it in the past few years. I grew up in a family where we always got real trees (but never until about a week or two before Christmas, much later than most people seem to these days), so I always disdained artificial trees. Love the smell of real pine! However, they are messy, and if you travel during the holidays as we often do, very hard to deal with the watering situation. So, we finally broke down about 8 years ago and bought a very nice artificial tree. I really didn't want to, but DH talked me into it. We used it once, then we moved into a house where there's just not a good place for it.

Since moving into our new house, the fancy artificial tree is in the attic. I've taken to decorating the house with rustic Christmas decor like wooden and iron figurines (reindeer, angels), baskets of pinecones, garlands tied with raffia, just simple stuff but definitely "holiday". I try to put a little something in every one of the downstairs rooms to make it festive, but no big tree.

We just added a sunporch, though the floor is not in yet (we'll be tiling, right now it's just raw plywood). Since we haven't furnished it yet, we actually have room for a tree out there. I didn't think of it until reading this thread. Maybe I'll get the big artificial tree out of the attic this year and go for it. I do have a lot of lovely ornaments, many handed down or handmade by my mother, and I miss not getting to use them. But I'm kinda lazy about the whole putting the tree up, the lights, decorating, and (even worse) undecorating the tree. We'll see how inspired I get!

Emily

[nancielle]

I love "real" Christmas trees but I live in an apartment and after a few years of hauling them up (and down) a couple of flights of stairs, I finally switched to an artificial tree. One of my local grocery stores gets pine scented candles in every year that really smells like pine trees so I burn those. I love lots of lights on the tree. One year though I had bought a set of lights from BJ's and they were much brighter than I expected. I could have landed a plane with that string of lights. I ended up giving them away to one of my sisters who decorates much more than I do (her kids thought the lights were cool.)

Christmas is the only holiday I decorate for. Love putting everything up, hate taking it all down in January though.

[short cut sally]

When we were first married, we decorated anything and everything, real trees and green artificial were used. All decorated with ornaments from both grandparents and my parents, all the old shiney brites. However,the artificial tree spent more and more time in the closet as xmas rolled around. The 6 foot artificial tree was given away and a few years ago was replaced with a 3 foot silver aluminum tree from the 50's. The tree is decorated with plastic strings of garland,shades of blue ornaments, and the cheesiest of lighting system is used. The color wheel. (Also from same era.) Yes, lucy from charlie brown would be happy. It is tacky but fits in my decor well. I do love decorating the house, i have vintage decorations, and love to get them all out and enjoy, but taking care of everything is such a pain. I think the older I get, the more a chore decorating seems to get. Now I know why my parents and grandparents decorated very little while I was growing up. I vowed I would'nt be like that when it came to the holidays, but the apple doesn't fall far from the tree now. I have good intentions but we'll see how far they get.

[Brandi]

All these stories are great! I love to hear what other people do or don't do. keep the stories going. Post pic's if you have any. Maybe some of us will be inspired. I would like to find a christmas bike ornament. Does anyone know where I can find one?

[Aggie_Ama]

Brandi- REI had some nice bike ornaments last year. That is where we got our paceline. It is a pewter-type. They also had a tandem and I think some others. I had to order it and have it sent to my local REI.

I will take pictures next week when the tree is up.